(LEX 18) — A lawmaker criticized Fayette County Public Schools for its new restroom design at Mary E. Britton Middle School during the Interim Education Committee meeting on Tuesday.
Rep. Matt Lockett, R-Nicholasville, said some of his Fayette County constituents have reached out with concerns about the "gender neutral" bathrooms being built in the school.
“While I’m assuming this is an effort to be all-inclusive, this design puts all students at risk," Lockett said. "So, let’s see this for what it is - this is a removal of gender from our schools."
The new restroom design features individual toilet rooms that open into a communal, open space with sinks and mirrors. According to Fayette County Public Schools, the individual toilet rooms will be completely private with a floor-to-ceiling door.
But Lockett believes the new bathroom design puts kids at risk.
“Sinks and mirrors will be used by both sexes. Gaps under the stall can be used to exploit or intimidate other students," he said. "These stalls can be seen from the hall.”
However, FCPS Superintendent Demetrus Liggins told lawmakers the new middle school will have designated restrooms for girls and boys.
“The principal has determined that there will be a set of restrooms that are for boys and there’s a set of restrooms that are for girls," said Liggins. "There’s nothing that has stated that these restrooms are gender neutral, if you will. They are simply for privacy purposes and they are for supervision purposes.”
Liggins presented lawmakers with data showing a significant increase in "behavior incidents" in school restrooms.
According to the Kentucky Department of Education's 2022-23 Safe Schools Annual Statistical Report, "incidents reported to have taken place in the restroom rose significantly. The most common events to have been reported in restrooms include tobacco use, tobacco possession, fighting and drug possession."
From the 2018-19 school year to the 2022-23 school year, "behavior events" in school restrooms across the state increased by 215%. In Fayette County, the increase was even more significant - 316%.
Liggins told lawmakers that 43% of students fear harassment in the bathrooms at school, 17% of Kentucky middle and high school students feel unsafe in school bathrooms, and 80% of educators agreed that bullying, misbehaviors, vandalism, and other negative behavior occurs in bathrooms.
Currently, school staff stand outside of restrooms for supervision, but the current bathroom design in most schools is limiting. Liggins believes the new design "allows for much more supervision."
"Our number one goal is to ensure that our students are able to use the restroom in private - use the restroom in peace, if you will - and not [in] fear of being harassed, without fear of being bullied and without fear of a lack of privacy," Liggins said.
“They are individual restrooms that allow students to go in and have complete privacy," Liggins added. "And they allow for supervision to where adults can actually see who goes in and out of the individual restrooms, unlike the traditional model to where there are individuals on the outside of the restroom and students are on the inside."
But some lawmakers raised issue with privacy, specifically in the communal sink and mirror area.
"If you have a girl in her cycle and [she] goes in there and has issues, she has to come out of there covered in blood, no privacy to wash her hands," said Sen. Lindsey Tichenor. "It is humiliating to think that a middle school girl would have to go through that."
But other lawmakers raised issue with the safety concerns current bathroom designs create in Kentucky schools.
“I walked down the hall on Friday past a 5th grade class using the restroom. A student comes out and says ‘somebody punched me in the bathroom,'" said Rep. Tina Bojanowski, who is a teacher in Louisville. "Well, what can the teacher say? She is not in the room.”
Rep. Lockett is proposing new legislation to deal with restrooms in Kentucky public schools.
He explains that it would require "all public schools in the Commonwealth that have more than 100 students to have at least 90% of their restroom facilities designated for boys or for girls. Thereby, allowing 10% to be all access restrooms."
"It's about protecting our innocent children. Keeping them safe. Allowing them to be boys and allowing them to be girls and providing a facility for learning where they won’t feel threatened, embarrassed, or be afraid to use the restrooms," Lockett added.
